


This Woman's Work

by Dusty



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Grief, Grief Sex, Grief/Mourning, Heartbreaking, Sensory Overload, displacement activity, post Skyfall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-20
Updated: 2013-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-29 23:35:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/692827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dusty/pseuds/Dusty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Memories of their journey together still living in his mind, James breaks into M's home for the last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Woman's Work

**Author's Note:**

> This was the original ending to my Conversations in the Car series, but as you know that spiralled into AU (to be continued ASAP). I am posting this as an option, but I am warning you, this is heartbreaking, as is the Greg Laswell song that inspired the title. It follows on from the chapter Bring Me To Life, but I'm not including it in the series for those of you who would rather not have it. 
> 
> Grief can manifest in so many ways, but initially, and to polarise, you can go numb, or you can feel everything in the extreme. For some reason the former is more acceptable (in Britain anyway!), leading many people to feel ashamed of intense thoughts and feelings they cannot control. Especially in the case of sexual arousal, which is deemed inappropriate, even though people are merely seeking contact and comfort.

  
_Pray God you can cope._   
_I stand outside this woman's work,_   
_This woman's world._   


It was so dark. Moonlight alone intruded; thin trickles of ivory outlining furniture and gracing curtains, briefly glimmering on the whiskey glasses.

The air still held her scent.

He slowly breathed it in, but his resolve gave way to a shaky exhale. He clenched his fist to steal his nerves and squeezed his eyes shut.

Stillness surrounded him. The heating was still timed to come on, a pleasant refuge from the bite of winter. Somewhere in the distance a car horn sounded. He opened his eyes again, conscious of time. He blinked into the room that he so badly wanted to keep forever inside him, but would undoubtedly soon be gone. Like her.

His fingers touched the fabric of the curtains, coarse and heavy, the sort of curtains that would endure for decades. The sort of curtains her grandchildren probably hid behind. The sort of curtains people with a sense of permanency have. The sort of curtains he would never own.

He lingered in her space, but it welcomed him. He smiled to himself. All the times she’d scolded him for creeping into her home. All the times he’d done it just to prove a point. How she would never again come home to find him trespassing. How he could never come home to her again.

His eyes had adjusted to the darkness. He removed his jacket, draping it impertinently on a chair with a daring smile, and began a respectful slink about her house, half expecting her to discover him and demand an explanation. If only she could. He’d happily take an earful, a beating, hell even a court marshal to have her, right now, step out in front of him with those flashing eyes.

His mind filled up with the possibility of her standing before him, angry, and he reacted before he could tell himself it was only his imagination. He fell to his knees in an act of contrition before her, before the empty space. He wept at her feet.

Tears rolled down his face as he murmured into the dark. He would never forget. He had never realised how much of him was taken up by her until she was gone. He knew she’d chide him if she could see him, crying under cover of darkness, on her territory no less.

His sobs eventually subsided. Having lost all sense of self, a rush of consciousness came back to him. _Time, time, time_. How long would it be before Tanner led a team of spooks in to make everything disappear? Everything that was M, everything that was MI6, leaving only the traces of a woman he barely knew. That wasn’t _her._

He had to salvage something. He whispered a request to see how it felt, _please can I_? His heart pounded, but it still felt safe. It felt good. It felt right. So he walked into her bedroom.

The room was watching him. He wondered if she was too. He swallowed and sat on her bed.

‘Sorry,’ he breathed. His fingertips traced the duvet cover. Satin. So much softer than those horrible curtains. He pressed a little harder, feeling the firmness of the mattress underneath, and felt his pulse quicken, knowing how this must have felt against her body, the glossy fabric against her skin, so very gentle, so very soft.

 _Her touch_.

Memories poured into his heart, everything they’d shared, but so much more recently their time in the car: their conversations, their arguments, her harsh words, her kind words, her firm hand, her careful caress. How she sat there beside him all that time. His companion. His passenger. And a bloody awkward one at that. But she learned to love the car…the car that was also destroyed.

So much seemed stripped away, but he could still sense her, how her hand had found his, the ghost of her palm on his face. That one moment that ruled them all. _My boy._

He lay down on his front, as if the bed itself could hold him, pressing his cheek into the fabric. The palms of his hands glided over the silky covers. _This is what she felt at night_. His brow found her pillow. _There she was_. Her scent, so strong. His body responded immediately.

His breath hitched, embarrassed by his arousal and the intensity of it. This was the last of her. His hips rolled into the bed and he gasped. Guilt hit him in the stomach. He closed his eyes and remembered.

_Her mouth, her fear, her touch, her anger._

He sighed into the pillow. He remembered how she’d kissed his neck, just hours before she’d died. He remembered how she’d given him orders, even in sex, her voice rich and commanding, yet tender. He rolled his hips again as all that was her enveloped him; the silken bed, the smell of her, his love of defying and provoking her, his illicit deeds, all surging suddenly into an irresistible sanctuary of pleasure.

_Her skin, her words, her moans._

He sobbed softly. She’d told him to lie face down. She’d snaked her hand around and pressed it against him while he obeyed her. He wanted her now. He didn’t want her to fade away from these sheets, this bed, this house.

_The ghost of her hand on him._

He pushed against the palm that wasn’t there, desperate to feel her. The lack of contact almost killed him. His own hand shot there instead, just as hers had, feeling his length through his jeans. He groaned, his other hand clutching wildly at the slippery cover. His body filled with want; need coursing through his veins. He breathed in that fragrance, something sweet, something spicy. His lips parted as if to kiss her, gasping for her, tasting the material. Once more he felt the ghost of her lips on his neck. She was all around him as he writhed and ground into his hand.

 _‘Careful’_ he remembered her say, her voice echoing in his mind. Her warning, her touch, her light slap causing his buttocks to tingle. He thrust harder, faster, defying her even now, desperate to reclaim her, to disobey her, to have her. To win this time.

 _Time, time, time_ pounded in his head as urgency clawed at him. He was going to do it, and how horrified would she be to find him like this? _Good_ , he thought. _Serves you right._ He imagined her in the doorway. The indignity of finding her agent humping her bed, violently getting off. He could see her fury, then her crooked smile, a gleam in her eyes. _She would like it. She would rise to the challenge. She would…_

His mind fell away and he was all impulse; impulse and her.

He came with a reckless scream, hot pleasure and rage rushing into each other, every part of him throbbing with expulsion, then relief, as he shuddered into the bedclothes.

Sharp, ragged breaths filled the room. He broke down in tears.

Some minutes later, he found the strength to push up off the bed. The crotch of his jeans held an incriminating stain. He grimaced, waves of shame lapping at his conscience. _If she could see me now…_

He washed his hands in her ensuite bathroom, taking care to avoid his reflection as her luxury handwash chased the evidence away. He felt meek and submissive, like a dog caught in a wrongdoing, its tail between its legs, yet presenting itself to its owner because negative attention is never as bad as none. His mouth turned dry as he realised she would never know, and never punish him, and never soothe him.

He returned to the bedroom. Her pillow lay tearstained on the crumpled bedspread. With near panic, fighting back tears, he restored the bed to how it was; neatly made and still expecting her. Looking about the room, he took in her private space, her hidden secrets, her intimate life. He never had, but he could now pry into everything: photos, underwear, letters. His stomach twisted and he hung his head. That was never going to happen, and he hoped she knew that.

He left the bedroom and recovered his jacket, pulling it on and around him to cover his sins. For a moment, he fancied he could hear her laughing at his disgrace, and for a moment, he chuckled with her. With once last glance at her living room, he bowed his head and disappeared into the night.

In the bedroom, the satin pillowslip clung to the tracks of his tears.


End file.
